Murray is old news now, says Raducanu before US Open return

Emma Raducanu is in no mood for sentimentality at the first grand-slam tournament since Andy Murray’s retirement, insisting that the US Open “doesn’t feel different at all” without Britain’s most successful player of the open era.
In the absence of Murray, Raducanu is the nation’s only active grand-slam singles champion. It was here at Flushing Meadows three years ago that the 21-year-old produced one of the most astonishing sporting achievements, becoming the first qualifier to win a major title.
Raducanu has previously hailed Murray as a “hero” but she caused a stir during Wimbledon last month when she suddenly withdrew from their mixed doubles partnership to focus on her singles campaign, denying him the opportunity to play his last scheduled match at the All England Club.
Now she prefers not to dwell on the past as six British players — Raducanu, Katie Boulter, Harriet Dart, Jack Draper, Dan Evans and Jan Choinski — prepare for the final grand-slam event of 2024.
“It doesn’t feel different at all,” Raducanu said. “Tennis is unforgiving in that sense. No matter who you are, it just moves on. There is always another match, there is always another tournament.
“Of course Andy has achieved amazing things and I watched him win this tournament [in 2012] but it is a fast pace, just like life is. It’s old news the next day.
“I think the Brits are doing really well right now. We are all pushing each other, we are all competitive. You see other ones doing well and you want to do the same.”
Raducanu skipped the Paris Olympics to instead focus on the North American hard-court swing and initially started well by reaching the quarter-finals of the Washington Open while most of the tour was competing on clay at Roland Garros. But she has not competed at all in the three weeks since, having turned down opportunities to take part in qualifying for the prestigious WTA 1000 tournaments in Toronto and Cincinnati. Instead she trained in London before travelling to New York on Monday.
“I didn’t play in Toronto because it was such a tight turnaround [qualifying started two days after her last match in Washington] but of course I would have loved to,” Raducanu said. “I have a Canadian passport [she was born in Toronto] but I would have had to have flown Saturday and played Sunday and it would have been too tight a turnover.
“I would have just been waiting to play Cincinnati qualifying [the following week]. It was difficult for me to play the week before the US Open because I didn’t want to risk picking anything up and then delaying my chances to be fully fit. We all thought it would be best to just go home and do things there.”
This approach has raised eyebrows, with the retired 2016 Olympic gold medallist Monica Puig questioning why the chance to play warm-up matches instead of practice sessions was rejected. Raducanu, who plays the 2020 Australian Open champion Sofia Kenin in the first round on Tuesday, insists, however, that she will never pack her schedule full of tournaments.
“I mix and match,” Raducanu said. “It depends. I don’t think I will ever be the player who is playing close to 30 events a year [she has played 12 so far]. It is not my style, it never has been. When I was playing juniors even, I would just play a few tournaments, play the slams and go to school. I have always done it that way. I am not in any big rush to play loads.”